I dont know. I'd like to know how and when the rumour got started, or an earlier instance of it being told. A lot of people here saying it's bull**** and it never happened, but they dont seem to know anything more than the rest of us.
Here comes the bull**** again. Monzon looked about the same size as Benvenuti. If he had an edge, it wasn't more than an inch or so. [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXivXNvb780&feature=related[/ame] Monzon looked at best as being the same size as Mundine, and maybe slightly smaller (see 0:25 where they're lined up) than him. Mundine is listed as 5' 11.5". [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nedmpE8Piq8[/ame]
It's very hard, as you must know, to disprove a negative..if you accused me of something that I really didn't do, I'd have a hard time proving I didn't do it if I didn't have a witness to that fact...and for the case in point, even if you tracked down Joe Frazier and asked him if this bull**** rumor was true or not, he'd snort, get very aggravated and look at you and say "HELL NO IT DIDN'T HAPPEN" than you'd have those who would be skeptical of Joe's veracity even then and say that he was covering up a less than flattering episode of his boxing life, or something of that nature. That's why these stupid rumors still breathe and don't go away.
Asking Joe Frazier, would be the logical step, and his answer either way would provide a lot more proof than we currently have either way. (id say it would make it 90% likely one way or ther other).
1) Why would Antuofermo make this up? 2) Frazier does state in his book "Box Like Pros" that Monzon was the greatest fighter of the 1970s. Perhaps he is basing this to some extent on personal experience!
He wasn't at the meeting. He might have been tired because he went to the International Boxing Hall of Fame affair.